Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Power Within
by dschaefer
Summary: This story takes place about two months after the Last Olympian.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Percy Hears From Grover

It was a beautiful day. The sun was shining and the wind was gently breezing. I lay in the shallows at Camp Half-Blood making whirlpools by my feet and just gazing up at the sky. Annabeth was nearby, displaying her vast architectural skill by making a 3-story miniature mansion out of sand. I watched her as she patiently restored a part of the house that had been pulverized by the waves, her gray eyes concentrating hard. I sighed, and sat up. I loved the weather, and the fact that I was hanging out with Annabeth on an awesome day, but things were so BORING around recently. After Kronos had been defeated, there weren't a whole lot of things to do at Camp Half-Blood but train and train some more. Every once in a while there would be a report of a monster somewhere, and a couple of campers would be dispatched to subdue it, and no one raised a fuss. I half smiled, almost not believing that I was wishing for a fight. A couple of months ago, peace and quiet was as nonexistent as the dinosaurs. I stood, shaking sand and shells out of my dark brown hair. Time to do something fun.

I looked around for a stimulus for my imagination, and saw it. A faded red surfboard was propped against a rock several feet away. I grinned, sprinted to the board, and brought it back to the shoreline. Annabeth looked up to see what I was doing, and gave me a patronizing look.

"Percy, are you really…?"

But she never got to finish, because I jumped high into the air and dove into the sea, making a colossal splash and almost demolishing her sand castle. Annabeth sighed and wrung the water out of her blond hair.

I swam underwater out a ways, and then came to the surface. I bobbed at the top of the water thinking. I had never been taught to surf, and I didn't really know how. Then I laughed at myself for being silly.

Sons of Poseidon don't need to LEARN how to surf. Psh.

I quickly skyrocketed out of the water like the ocean threw me out, which is essentially what it did. I came down on the board, and stood on it, controlling the waves and using them to keep me balanced. Then I turned, and blasted forward like being shot out of a cannon. Lifting a hand, I pulled up a wall of water and went directly up it, corkscrewing in the air and coming back down the wave like a ramp. I was now going very fast, so I put one hand under my board and jumped, pulled the board out from under me, and dove back under water. I used the momentum to propel me back to shore, and once I was close enough, I blasted out of the water, sailed over Annabeth, and hit the sand rolling. I popped up and grinned, bowing to an imaginary audience. Annabeth rolled her eyes and sardonically clapped. Then she stopped, and her eyes widened as she pointed to behind me. I turned around, and saw that there was a rainbow behind me from the water I had sprayed.

"Iris message." she said. "Somebody wants to talk to you."

I fished in my pocket for a golden drachma, then tossed it into the rainbow. The rainbow shimmered, and Grover appeared.

"Grover!" I said. "Where have you been? I haven't seen you for weeks!!"

Grover was a satyr (half-man, half-goat) that had been one of my best friends for a really long time. He had been appointed by Pan to spread the word to the other satyrs to help rebuild the forests and wild areas of the world. Recently though, he had been missing in Washington somewhere. Grover had a worried look on his face, but he smiled when he saw me.

"I've been busy. When I got to Washington, I heard rumors that there was a sleeping boy in the woods that wouldn't wake up." Grover gnawed on an aluminum Dr Pepper can. "I went to see if it was true." He paused.

"Aaaand?" I said impatiently.

Grover frowned. "And it was. He was sleeping in the glade, peaceful as you please. And he wasn't dead, because he had a faint pulse, but he wouldn't wake up. He looked to be 11 years old. Well, I tried everything. Pushing, shoving, playing my pipes. He wouldn't get up." Grover looked decidedly nervous by this point. "So finally, I was going to walk away when I tripped over his arm. When I got up and turned around, his arm was bleeding a little. Then, his arm sank into the dirt like it was absorbed." I raised my eyebrows. Grover continued. "Then his arm came back up, fully healed. Percy? I think I found a son of Earth."

I froze. If Grover meant…

"Do you mean a son of Gaea, the Earth Mother?"

Grover nodded. "Yeah. I'm going to try to move him, but we need to get him to camp now. If I'm right, he's incredibly powerful."

I nodded. I had fought a son of Earth during the Kronos Crisis in Daedalus' labryinth. "I didn't even know Gaea could reproduce with mortals. The kid did bleed actual blood, right?"

Grover nodded. "Yes, blood. Not ichor." Ichor was the blood of the pureblooded gods.

I scratched my head. "Okay, thanks Grover. Try to move him somewhere else. If he wakes, don't tell him ANYTHING."

Grover snorted. "Of course not. See you Percy." Then the rainbow disappeared.

I turned to Annabeth.

"Chiron?" he asked.

Annabeth looked deep in thought. I noted that she looked a lot like her mother Athena. "Yeah. Chiron."


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

The Oracle

Annabeth and I tore through the mass of cabins to a structure we called the Big House. It's located in the center of camp, and Chiron and Dionysus have rooms there. I was willing to bet a sand dollar that they were sitting inside, playing cards and eating grapes. We reached the door, knocked, and went in without waiting for a response. Chiron and Dionysus were sitting at their table, playing cards. I almost smiled. Almost.

Chiron looked a little surprised. "Percy, Annabeth, what's the matter?"

Annabeth replied swiftly, "We got an Iris-message from Grover. He found another demigod…and the kid might be a son of Gaea."

Dionysus looked up sharply. "A son of Earth?" Then he got his bored look again. "Fantastic." He chewed on a grape.

Chiron frowned. "I haven't ever heard of a demigod son of Earth. We don't have a cabin for them here. Even with the recent, ah…improvements."

The camp had recently had a number of new cabins added for most of the minor gods. However, there weren't many cabins for children of the Titans, and certainly not for the Old Gods, such as Mother Earth or Uranus. But Chiron straightened up.

"No matter." He said. "He can just stay here at the Big House or in the Hermes cabin until we can get something built for him. Regardless of where he stays, getting him here is our number one priority. Go see Rachel for a prophecy."

I nodded and we went upstairs.

Rachel Elizabeth Dare, one of my best friends, volunteered herself to be the new Oracle a couple months before. Apollo put in her the Spirit of Delphi, causing Rachel to have infrequent bursts of foresight, in the form of riddles. She was invaluable in the Kronos crisis, and I hoped she could help us now. We got upstairs, and we went up through the trapdoor to the attic where Rachel kept a small artist studio. Inside, we found her concentrating on a painting of what looked like the former god Pan. It was a very good picture, and I said so. Rachel turned around and smiled at us.

"Hey Percy! Hey Annabeth!"

Annabeth scowled. I got the feeling she didn't like Rachel very much, for some reason. I smiled, though.

"Hi Rachel!" I said. "We're going on a search and rescue mission for Grover and another demigod. Chiron sent us up here for a prophecy."

Rachel frowned and sat down, eyes closed. She remained like that for several minutes, till I thought she had fallen asleep. Then she looked up.

"Sorry Percy." She said. "I'm not getting anything."

This was a little surprising to Annabeth and I, because a mission with this much potential for disaster almost always had a prophecy. I raised an eyebrow.

"Nothing? No hints or anything?"

Rachel shook her head. "Nothing."

Annabeth mused. "That's odd." She said no more, but just sat there, deep in thought.

I couldn't think of a reason why there was no prophecy, but I didn't dwell on it. "Let's go tell Chiron."

Annabeth nodded and stood up. "Yeah."

We told Rachel good-bye and went downstairs. Dionysus was still there drinking a Diet Coke, but Chiron wasn't. Anticipating our question, Dionysus spoke.

"Chiron went outside to the lake. Probably wanted to send an Iris-message. He said to go find him when you came back down." Dionysus looked at his pop can and mumbled something unintelligible. I didn't really want to know what the grumpy camp director had said, so Annabeth and I went outside to find Chiron. He was indeed at the lake sending an Iris-message, but I was too far away to see who it was. He noticed us and ended the message, then trotted over.

"That was Grover. He's doing fine, but he would like you two to come help him. You need to leave very soon. Did you get a message from Rachel?"

I shook my head. "She said she got nothing."

Chiron frowned. "Well, that's unfortunate, because you're figuratively flying blind, but it'll have to do. You still need to leave. Pack your things, and you'll leave with Argus."

I nodded, and in two and a half minutes we were getting into the car we keep at camp. We didn't really have much stuff to pack; food, water, and our individual gifts from our parents. I had Riptide, my celestial bronze sword, and Annabeth had her New York Yankees invisibility cap. We drove away to Washington, and I couldn't shake the feeling we were driving into trouble.


End file.
